Recently on MindTricks Radio, I had a lively conversation with author and speaker Carla Ondrasik about a surprisingly powerful idea: the difference between trying and doing. At first glance it sounds like semantics. After all, isn’t trying the first step toward doing? But as Carla pointed out—and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense—the word try often carries an invisible escape hatch. It leaves the door open for hesitation, procrastination, and excuses. “I’ll try to get to the gym.” “I’ll try to call you back.” “I’ll try to start that project.” Without realizing it, we’re already lowering the bar before we’ve even begun.
When we say we’re going to do something, the psychological landscape changes. There’s commitment in the language. Our brains shift from neutral into gear. Suddenly the task isn’t a vague possibility floating somewhere in the future—it’s an action that requires movement. Carla described it with a simple analogy: saying you’ll try is like putting a car in neutral—your engine might be running, but you’re not actually going anywhere. Saying you’ll do something is like shifting into drive. Once that decision is made, your mind starts solving problems and figuring out what steps need to happen next.
One of the most interesting points from our conversation was how the language of “trying” often hides deeper fears. Sometimes it’s fear of failure. Sometimes it’s fear of success and the expectations that might come with it. Other times it’s simply procrastination disguised as productivity. We tell ourselves we’re “working on it,” when in reality we’re circling around the task rather than engaging with it. Carla shared a story about a man she met in a park who told her he was “trying to get back into swimming.” Her response was simple: Why don’t you stop trying to swim and just go swim? The next day he excitedly reported that he had done exactly that. The shift from intention to action was immediate once the mental barrier disappeared.
Another practical idea we discussed was the importance of tackling difficult tasks early. Carla referenced the classic productivity principle sometimes called “eat the frog”—do the hardest or most unpleasant task first thing in the day. Most procrastination comes from imagining that something will be harder or more uncomfortable than it actually is. Once it’s finished, the mental weight lifts, and the rest of the day often feels easier and more productive. Action creates clarity, while hesitation tends to multiply stress.
There’s also something deeply liberating about committing to action even when success isn’t guaranteed. Fear of failure often hides behind the language of trying. If we only “try,” we can protect ourselves from disappointment if things don’t work out. But the truth is that most regret in life comes not from the things we attempted and failed at, but from the things we never pursued at all. Doing doesn’t promise perfection. It simply opens the door to learning, growth, and experience.
So the next time you catch yourself saying, “I’ll try,” pause for a moment. Ask whether you’re really committing to action or quietly giving yourself permission to stay stuck. Sometimes the smallest shift in language can spark the biggest shift in behavior. Stop trying. Start doing. Your future self will likely be glad you did.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Carla, welcome to the show.
Carla Ondrasik: Hello. Thanks for having me this morning.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: I’m so excited to speak with you today. I read your book, Stop Trying, and I just was absolutely floored. It was such a wonderful book, and I’m sure it’s going to be so helpful to my patients. So congratulations on that and great job. I really like to spend some time getting to know my guests before we get into the meat of the interview. I’d like to ask you a little bit about your background. But before we get to that, I need to get one thing out of the way. You don’t like that word try very much, do you?
Carla Ondrasik: Not at all. I don’t like it at all.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: I kind of gathered that from the book. I’d like to hear all about the reasons why, and we’re going to talk about that. To start with, you have a very interesting background. Tell us a bit about your background. I know you were in the songwriting business for many years, but I’m not sure how that coalesced into your current incarnation of your professional life as a motivational speaker and a coach and all of that. So tell us a bit about your background and how you got to where you are today.
Carla Ondrasik: It’s so amazing. I never thought I’d be an author and a motivational speaker. But going backwards, I was raised in New York, on Long Island, New York. My dad, I’m one of three girls, and my dad was a gambler. So that will tell you that my life was not conventional. My parents were together until the day my dad passed away like 11 years ago. My mom’s still alive, but they had this incredible relationship. There were times in our life growing up where it was like, get in the car, we’re leaving for the week, and it was very fluid. Things changed suddenly. There was a time when I was about 13 that my whole life disappeared — the dog, the Barbie dolls, my home, my friends. I was uprooted. So it really caused me to be a person that can think on my feet and adapt to a situation. I brought that into my adult life. I’ve had some really incredible jobs. One was working for the Department of Defense. I started out waving people through the gate, checking badges, but very quickly moved up to top secret security clearance flown in by helicopter. Then I worked for an aviation company where I was the employee relations coordinator, communicating with people on the shop floor and upper management and making sure needs were met, which I loved. Then the universe threw me the biggest curveball in the world. I met a songwriter who had a song on the radio. At the time I was dating a guy who was an engineer and writing songs when he came home from work. I thought, I can help get him songs on the radio. That threw me into the whole world of music publishing. I just started working with songwriters and got one job after another job after another job. I love to make people’s dreams come true. It’s what I did in my other careers when I was working with employees and employee relations. In music publishing I’d take a songwriter who wanted to have a song on a record and it was my job to put writers together, sign them, develop them, and get their songs on hit records. My final position was vice president of creative writer development for EMI on the West Coast, which was the biggest publishing company in the world at the time. Not many women in those kinds of positions. How I got there was through being very aggressive and doing a lot of doing — action — nothing hesitant. I placed songs with everybody from the oldies but the goodies, Earth, Wind and Fire, Johnny Mathis, Barbra Streisand, all the way up to NSYNC, Christina Aguilera, Mariah Carey, Martina McBride. I gave songs to so many people. I discovered my husband — he performs under the moniker Five for Fighting and he’s the Grammy-nominated artist still touring and was just in your state of Hawaii recently.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Yeah. Just going to say playing at the Blue Note, right?
Carla Ondrasik: He was at the Blue Note for two nights, four shows. He was so great. I heard his voice through a wall and thought, that voice needs to be on the radio. So I signed him to a publishing deal, developed him as a writer, got him the record deal, then married him, which leads us up to the present time. We have two children. I’m a workhorse. I left my job because John’s career took off and we had our little kids. Of course I volunteered at school. I’m the president of my HOA. I’m on many boards — the local zoo board. I just work, work, work. The common thread through all of this — what made me successful in all those careers — is my mindset. It’s not using one word that affects your mindset and your actions, which is try. The opportunity came. I really thought if I don’t write this book and share my message with people, I’m going to regret it.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: What was the aha moment where you recognized that and you took your experiences in your life and converted into writing the book?
Carla Ondrasik: The aha moment really started from being a child and being thrown into situations where you’ve got to sink or swim. Trying is not an option there. I’m not able to passively go, I’m in the deep end of the ocean and I have to get out of it. I have to find my life preservers. There’s nothing hesitant about figuring things out. When you’re in the middle of a sieve in music publishing there are thousands of songs that want to get on one 10-song album. There were hundreds and thousands of publishers worldwide. What’s going to make me the one that gets my songwriter on that record? Not only on the record but the single, the song everybody hears. I realized I don’t ever wish, hope, or want. It’s doing, having, and being. I jump straight to the end game. Maybe it’s as a mom and being involved in motivating people all the time that the word always triggered me. It set off bells and whistles and made me crazy every time I heard it. So the opportunity came up for me to write a book and I thought I’m going to take it and I’m going to do this without any experience. I’d never read a book about writing a book. I never desired to be an author. But I thought I’m being presented with these opportunities. I’m going to do it.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: You’re definitely a doer, Carla. That’s very evident and you’ve done a lot of really amazing things in your life. Let’s dig into this a little bit more. The difference between trying and doing — one might argue that trying to do something is the first step to doing it. I have a feeling you don’t see it that way. How are they getting it wrong?
Carla Ondrasik: Because we’re tricked into thinking that we’re doing something, and it’s not in our conscious mind every day.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: It’s interesting. Semantically speaking, you can tell yourself you’re going to try something and you can tell yourself you’re going to do something. In either case, you may end up not doing it or you may not succeed at doing it. But what I’m hearing is that there’s something in the emotional valence of the word try that’s different from dothat sets you up for a greater chance of not completing or not succeeding at that task.
You talk in your book about how sometimes people think that if you try you’re being brave, but you make some interesting statements that it’s actually the opposite—that there’s something in trying versus doing that’s the opposite of bravery. Let’s talk a little bit more about that.
Carla Ondrasik: Trying is, first of all, dipping your toe in the water. If you think about it, it’s very hesitant and passive. You even say it softly. “Okay, I’ll give it a try.” You’re like, “I’ll try,” as opposed to “I’m doing it.” When you say “I’m doing it,” your voice gets louder. You sit up taller. You’re more confident. You’re entering it from a really strong position. But “I’ll give it a try” is smaller and weaker. You’re building in the intention and the potential for failure when you say “I’ll try,” because you’re implying it may not happen. I’m going to try. I may fail, but at least I’ll try. It’s not brave to rely on excuses.
For example:
“I tried to be here at nine o’clock but I forgot that it was nine. I thought it was nine-thirty.” There’s an excuse.
Or blame:
“I tried to get here at nine o’clock but I had some emails I had to return so I’m late.”
There’s no accountability. It’s not brave when you say, “I tried. I didn’t do it. So sue me.” You only said you would try. You didn’t say you would do it. All those things are completely different when you say, “I will be there at nine o’clock.” Because then what happens is you don’t return those last few emails walking out the door. You make sure you have gas in the car the night before. Trust me—if you were meeting a doctor who had a nine o’clock appointment to save your life, you wouldn’t show up at nine-thirty. You wouldn’t say you tried to get there. We don’t try to get to the airport to make our flight because there’s so much riding on it. We’ve spent money on the ticket. Trying isn’t brave. It’s passive, hesitant, and safe.
We’ve been taught:
“Try harder.”
“Try your best.”
“Give it a try.”
So we have to unlearn that. We have to shine the spotlight on how this word is hurting us instead of helping us.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: So telling yourself you’re going to try is sort of hedging. It gives you the opportunity not to succeed. Whereas telling yourself “I’m going to do that” is brave because you’re committing to something that you might not succeed at. That’s the brave thing—committing to something. Saying, “I’m going to do this.” If it doesn’t happen, then there are the consequences of failing at something. That does happen in life. But the brave thing is facing the possibility of failing with your full effort.
Carla Ondrasik: Absolutely. Facing fear is brave. Facing the unknown is brave. Not stepping back on the side and trying hesitantly and running away the minute something gets uncomfortable. It’s like dipping your toe in the water—“Oh, it’s too cold.” No. Jump in. Dive in.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Exactly. Anybody from Hawaii knows that. The surfers certainly aren’t hesitant about getting in the water.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly. You may want to get out later. You may not like it. But at least you went in and experienced it.That’s the important thing.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Right. So when we’re telling ourselves “try” instead of “do,” what messages are we sending ourselves?
Carla Ondrasik: We’re telling ourselves that it may not happen. We’re afraid of failure. So we say things like:
“I’m trying to start a business.”
“I’m trying to write a screenplay.”
But we don’t want to say “I’m doing it” because what if we fail? What will people think? Will they judge us? When you say you’re trying, you can procrastinate. It creates the perfect environment for procrastination. It allows an easy route with lots of distractions. People sometimes fear both failure and success. For example, with my book I could have told myself:
“What if this is successful? Now I’m going to have to start social media, do interviews, answer emails, and re-enter the workforce.”
That could make me want to half-do the book, stretch it out, never finish it—but still sound like I’m doing something. We pacify ourselves into thinking we’re doing something.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That reminds me of something I see in my practice a lot—fear of success. People succeed at something and suddenly expectations rise. Now the stakes are higher. Now they can really fail. So they avoid getting into that cycle in the first place.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly.
Trying is a mental action. Doing is a physical action.
For example:
I can touch my nose. Or I can not touch my nose. But trying to touch my nose doesn’t make sense. Trying is thinking, planning, worrying, making lists—but not actually doing.
Let me tell you a story. I used to take my kids to the park every morning. There was a guy who walked there every day with headphones on. One day his headphones weren’t working and I asked what he was listening to. He said podcasts and motivational talks because there were so many things in life he was trying to do but couldn’t get done. So I asked him to name one thing. He said he was trying to start swimming at the YMCA pool. I said, “Why don’t you stop trying to swim and just go swim?” That was the entire conversation. The next day he stood across the park yelling,
“I did it! I swam! I didn’t try—I swam!”
That’s exactly what trying is. He spent all that time listening to motivation instead of swimming. Our brain actually backs this up neurologically. When you say “I’m going to try,” brain activity lights up a little. When you say “I’m going to do,” the brain lights up dramatically more. It’s like putting a car in neutral versus drive.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That’s a great metaphor.
Carla Ondrasik: Your brain is waiting for direction. If you say “try,” it stays in neutral. If you say “do,” the gears engage.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Carla, you’re such a charismatic person. I imagine you have a lot of moments like that park story where you impact someone quickly.
Carla Ondrasik: It happens all the time. I raised my children not to use the word try. My husband stopped using it. My friends stopped using it. I speak to rooms full of people and you can literally see their brains click. It’s immediate.
Carla Ondrasik: I’ll back up to answer that question. What we think trying means and what it really means are two different things. We think that trying is that brave first step. We think trying is doing. If you look at any dictionary definition they’ll say trying is an attempt or an effort to do something. But the real definition of trying is a half-hearted attempt or effort to do something. There’s a huge difference when you say I’m going to try to do something. Here’s an example. Unconsciously, subconsciously, we know it’s already in there. My job is to bring it to the forefront of our minds and use it as a tool every day. That’s my goal. You can still try if you want to choose to try, but I want to make sure you understand what you’re doing and what’s happening neurologically in your brain when you say you’re going to try to do something instead of I’m going to do it. Doing doesn’t guarantee success. Doing guarantees you a better chance at success. I’m not talking semantics. Imagine you have your coffee mug in front of you and you say I’m going to try to take a sip. Odds are you’re going to pick up the cup and take a sip. I’m talking about big ticket items — our health, our happiness, our careers, our relationships — as in I’m trying to work on my marriage. I’m trying to lose weight. People try to lose weight for their whole lives or try to quit smoking for decades. When I said it’s already in there, think about this: would you go to a bank that says okay Carla we’re going to try to keep track of your money here and we’re going to try to have it available to you when you want to withdraw?
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Of course not.
Carla Ondrasik: Probably not. You rent an apartment and they don’t say look can you just try to pay your rent every month. If you don’t pay your rent you’re going to get evicted. You can’t try to pay your mortgage or you’ll go into foreclosure. We’re not allowed to try and we don’t choose to try. It’s already in there. We don’t send our kids out on their first solo drive saying hey try to drive carefully and try to stop at the stop signs and try not to be distracted. There’s no try in there. So it’s in there but sadly we do try. It happens all the time. I raised my children not to use the word try from birth. My husband—it’s affected his life. All of my friends and the people that know me, the people I work with—they don’t try anymore. I just got a beautiful note from my publicist who said, “Carla, taxes are due and I told my accountant I’m going to work on this over the weekend.” But she said she told herself, “I’m going to have it done. I’m not going to try. I will have this done by Sunday.” She said had she never met me or worked on this book, she guarantees she wouldn’t have delivered it on time. I speak to rooms full of people and you can literally see their brains click. It’s such an immediate, effective change and it’s so much fun. I love delivering the message.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: I can imagine the people in your orbit don’t get away with complaining about trying and not doing very easily.
Carla Ondrasik: They love me and hate me at the same time. They’re like, “Now I can’t say that anymore.” I’ll be sitting in a restaurant and overhear someone saying to their friend, “I’m trying to get closer to my sister,” or “I’m trying to work on that relationship.” I want to jump across the table and say, What does that look like? Why wouldn’t you go all in? Why wouldn’t you fly across the country if that’s where she lives? Why wouldn’t you apologize, write a letter, send flowers, do something meaningful? Saying “I’m trying to work on the relationship” feels good to them because it sounds like they’re doing something. But they may still not be doing what it takes.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Even if they do that and it doesn’t work, at least they won’t regret not trying harder.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly. She may not repair the relationship. The sister may not reciprocate. But she will know in her heart she did everything she could. She didn’t half-do it.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: There’s nothing sadder than regret as you get older—looking back and thinking about what you didn’t do.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly. People regret what they didn’t do far more than what they did do.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Let’s talk more about procrastination because it’s such a big one. I see a lot of high school students in my practice. They’re very bright kids, but they wait until the last minute to do homework or study. They get it done but it’s stressful and usually not their best work. What advice would you give to someone like that?
Carla Ondrasik: I’ll tell you something fun you can teach them—it’s called Eat the Frog.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: I haven’t heard that one.
Carla Ondrasik: It’s attributed to Mark Twain. The idea is that if you have to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. In other words, do the worst task first. Get it out of the way. People procrastinate because they imagine something will take forever or be terrible. But usually it takes much less time than we expect. Once it’s done, you feel amazing. Then you have the whole day free.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That’s a great metaphor.
Carla Ondrasik: I’ll give you a story about my son. He moved to Texas and needed to find a dentist and a doctor. I told him he needed to take care of that. He said, “I’ll try to get around to it.” I reminded him who his mother was. Not long after that, he had to have four wisdom teeth removed and was in terrible pain—with no dentist. That was the consequence of procrastination.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That’s a painful lesson.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly. When we procrastinate we create secondary problems.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: I like your point that instead of saying “I’ll try,” sometimes it’s more honest to say “I’m not going to do it right now.”
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly. Saying no is powerful. If you say, “I’m not going to do it right now,” you’re owning the decision. That removes the guilt and anxiety of pretending you’re going to try.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: As a therapist, that’s very similar to how we approach decisions in therapy. The important thing is that people understand the consequences of their choices and own them.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Let’s talk about excuses versus reasons, which you discuss in your book.
Carla Ondrasik: A reason is a valid justification for not doing something. An excuse is simply a justification used to avoid doing something. For example, a reason might be a medical condition preventing weight loss. An excuse would be saying you couldn’t stick to a diet because of parties or family meals. There are ways around that.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That ties into the concept of deflection, which psychologists would call a defense mechanism.
Carla Ondrasik: Yes. Deflection means shifting responsibility to outside sources—blaming traffic, blaming coworkers, blaming teachers—anything to avoid accountability.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Let’s talk about the inner critic versus the destructive critic.
Carla Ondrasik: The inner critic says things like:
“You’re too old.”
“You’re too young.”
“You’re not qualified.”
When I wrote my book at 62, my inner critic said, “Who are you to write a book?” You have to silence that voice. Otherwise you’ll never do anything.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: But there is also a useful critical voice that can guide you.
Carla Ondrasik: Yes, a constructive voice that keeps you thoughtful and aware. But the destructive voice is loud and often stops people before they begin.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: When someone fails at something, that destructive voice can get louder.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly. That’s the cycle: Try → fail → inner critic → give up.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: In therapy we try to break that cycle by helping people gain evidence through experience that they can succeed.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly. Start small. Clean a junk drawer. That small success gives you a hit of motivation and confidence.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Motivation often follows action, not the other way around.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: I just finished writing my novel When Earth Blinks, which comes out next month, and I have enormous respect for writers now.
Carla Ondrasik: Congratulations. Writing a book is incredibly hard work.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: It really is.
Carla Ondrasik: Millions of people say they want to write a book, but very few actually do it.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Let’s talk about the Eisenhower Matrix, which you discuss in your book.
Carla Ondrasik: The Eisenhower Matrix is a productivity tool created by President Dwight D. Eisenhower. It helps categorize tasks into four groups:
- Urgent and important
- Important but not urgent
- Not important but urgent
- Not important and not urgent
From there you decide whether to do, schedule, delegate, or eliminate tasks.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That helps prioritize what really matters.
Carla Ondrasik: Exactly.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: As we come toward the end of our conversation, let’s talk about the benefits of a doing mindset.
Carla Ondrasik: The biggest one for me is no regret. Trying stretches things into an endless future. Doing happens now.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That’s powerful.
Carla Ondrasik: Another benefit is professional success. Doers get promoted. They become leaders because people trust them to deliver.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: That makes sense.
Carla Ondrasik: Doing also reduces anxiety and builds confidence. You start having fun with challenges.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: I love that idea.
Carla Ondrasik: And you also develop self-compassion. You allow yourself to fail and learn.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Carla, this has been a really lively and engaging conversation. I really enjoyed speaking with you about Stop Trying. Any final thoughts?
Carla Ondrasik: Have fun with this idea. Notice how often people say “try.” Maybe even make a game out of it with your family or coworkers. Everyone has something they’ve been trying to do. Ask yourself what it is—and why you’ve been trying instead of doing.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Since reading your book I’ve been noticing how often I say the word try. It’s surprisingly frequent.
Carla Ondrasik: Even when I go shopping I say I’m going to put clothes on, not try them on. I’ve completely reprogrammed myself.
Dr. Aaron Kaplan: Carla, thank you so much for joining us today. It’s been wonderful speaking with you.
Carla Ondrasik: Thank you. I’m grateful for your time as well.
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